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Remember, every Friday is mid-major day here at RTC. Half of the mid-major leagues are covered one week, with the other half the next. Here are last week’s Check-Ins in case you missed them while dealing with the holiday weekend…

Your Watercooler Moment. Yes, Paul Hewitt is still at Georgia Tech, and yes, the Ramblin’ Wreck is still one. If your memory was hazy as to why major conference schools don’t like visiting mid-majors on their home floors, Kennesaw State’s blitzing of Georgia Tech tonight, 80-63, is your reminder. But be honest — have you even heard of Kennesaw State before? The Owls joined Division I a mere five years ago and its best win in five-plus years of basketball at the highest collegiate level was a two-point victory over conference rival Belmont in 2007-08. It’s quite a leap to go from sneaking by a mid-100s RPI conference opponent to obliterating an ACC foe from start to finish, even one as generally unpredictable and disappointing as Georgia Tech, but the sellout crowd at the school a half-hour north of Atlanta loved it. Kennesaw State took a fourteen-point lead into the half, and except for a couple of minor pushes by the Jackets, they were never truly threatened tonight. Paul Hewitt reportedly has a huge buyout in his contract, but we figure eventually Georgia Tech is going to tire of year after year of mediocrity despite the lure and promise of star recruits coming onto campus, right? We think there’s no greater tell of the abilities of Hewitt to get it done at Georgia Tech than the fact that he’s never in ten years in Atlanta finished better than 9-7 in the ACC — and he’s only done that once (in 2004). And consider the players who have come through GT: Chris Bosh, Jarrett Jack, Will Bynum, Javaris Crittenton, Anthony Morrow, Thaddeus Young, Derrick Favors, Gani Lawal. Only a handful of schools nationally have put more players into the NBA than Paul Hewitt, yet this surfeit of talent simply hasn’t translated to success at the collegiate level. He needs to go, and this loss may have been the ugly slap to the face that Tech administrators need to finally cut him loose.

Hewitt Has No Answers (AJC/C. Compton)

Tonight’s Hits…

Mini-RTC at Kennesaw State. Honestly, we’re not sure when a school like Kennesaw would get another shot at something like this, so we’re somewhat shocked that the entire student body wasn’t immediately on the floor after the final buzzer. Maybe they’re still new to this whole basketball thing. Nevertheless, there was a mini-RTC of which we found photographic evidence. If anyone has a better photo or can show more students filling the floor, we’ll count it as a full one, and the first of the 2010-11 season.

There Was a Mini-RTC at Kennesaw Tonight

Clarence Jackson. During several portions of tonight’s Siena game at Minnesota, it appeared that the confident Jackson was going to win the game all by himself. He had 29/5/4 assts including five threes and if he’d gotten any help from his teammates — he had more FGs and points than the other four starters combined — Siena may have been able to walk out of the Barn with a big win.

Fordham’s Streak. It took 322 days and 23 games but the nation’s current longest losing streak ended tonight when Fordham defeated Sacred Heart, 69-51. Good for those guys, and even better that they really did it in a convincing fashion. Chris Gaston had 12/17/4 blks.

Nikola Vucevic. Could be one of the more underrated and unknown big men in the nation — through two games the USC forward is averaging 21/13 against not-terrible competition (UC Irvine and Santa Clara).

Double Your Morris Trouble. The Kansas twins Marcus and Markieff Morris both had dub-dubs tonight — Marcus went for 22/11 while his brother dropped 12/13 in an easy win over Valparaiso. The win was also KU’s 61st consecutive home victory, one short of its all-time record. Watch out, North Texas (Friday night’s opponent).

Atlantic Sun! Just a few days after Stetson took out Wake Forest, Kennesaw State did the same to Georgia Tech. What’s the lesson here? Maybe yellow and gold teams shouldn’t play A-Sun squads? Or maybe those ACC teams are really struggling right now.

Oakland. The Golden Grizzlies going into the MAC favorite’s gym and easily dispatching them after getting rolled up over the weekend by WVU was an impressive win, and the kind of thing that will be very helpful come March. Keith Benson didn’t even play all that well (10/6/3 blks while in foul trouble), but OU was still able to win easily.

Steve Lavin. Lavin gets a nod here for having the cojones to schedule his team to play 3,000 miles away in a bandbox gym at 2 am ET. This was going to almost assuredly be a loss for his team, but we have a sneaky suspicion that putting his players through this will be a good learning and bonding experience for them that will help come the rigors of Big East play later this year.

Fred Landers (F) – UNF. Normally we would go with Lester Wilson, a forward out of Knoxville who decided to stay in Tennessee when he signed with ETSU, but the glut of perimeter players on the Buccaneer roster will probably limit Wilson’s playing time. Landers won’t have such a problem at UNF where he should get plenty of playing time at power forward and should contribute immediately for a team with an anemic offense where their leading scorer only scored 9.0 PPG.

What You Need To Know

Last year the conference regular season championship was mess with four teams having identical 14-6 conference records. That kind of parity should not be an issue this year as it seems like two teams (Belmont and ETSU) have separated themselves from the rest of the field.

After responding surprisingly well to losing five seniors last season, Belmont returns a team that should be the dominant team in the conference for the next two to three seasons with only two seniors on this year’s roster. Clark should be the driving force behind their push to make it back to the NCAA Tournament. You might remember the Bruins from their last trip to the NCAA Tournament in 2008 when they lost to #2 seed Duke by a single point in the opening round.

While the Bruins will be relying on underclassmen, the Buccaneers will be relying on a strong group of seniors led by Mike Smith, a guard who was injured last year after only four games. Many expected the Buccaneers to fall apart after losing Smith, but they rebounded to make win the Atlantic Sun Tournament and make it to the NCAA Tournament before losing to #1 seeded Kentucky.

If you are looking for a sleeper, keep an eye on Lipscomb who could be a threat with what might be the best 1-2 punch in the conference with Hodzic and Slater. If the Bisons are going to surprise Belmont and ETSU, those two will need help from Jordan Burgason (12.8 PPG) and Brandon Brown (10.4 PPG).

Predicted Champ

Belmont (NCAA Seed: #14). With their solid performance in what was supposed to be a rebuilding year last year, Rick Byrd should expect to make a trip back to the NCAA Tournament this year if they are able to overcome ETSU and Lipscomb. Even though the Bruins will rely heavily on Clark and Mick Hedgepeth (11.6 PPG and 6.5 RPG), they will need to get production out of Scott Saunders and Jon House on the inside and steady perimeter play from Drew Hanlen, Jonny Rice, and Jordan Campbell to win the Atlantic Sun.

Wild Saturday. Obviously, there’s a million things to talk about this weekend, but this special ATB Saturday edition will focus exclusively on the thirteen conference tournaments that were going on across the country today. In our usual weekend edition on Sunday night, we’ll discuss all the other games from the bigger conferences who are still finishing up regular season action, including the upsets of #1 Syracuse, #5 Kansas State and so forth. Bear with us, as we’ll be back tomorrow.

Conference Tourneys. The ‘expanded’ NCAA Tourney continued today with another 35 teams eliminated on this glorious Saturday of hoops across the nation.

Murray Wins 30 Games For the First Time in OVC History (M. Dann)

Ohio Valley. Murray State pulled away late from the #2 seed, Morehead State, to win its eighth conference championship in the last sixteen years. The Racers also reached the 30-win mark for the first time in school and OVC history en route to its fourteenth NCAA Tournament bid. In an ugly, defensive-oriented game, it was Isaiah Canaan who came off the bench for the Racers to provide offensive punch (16/5), but it was his block on a breakaway dunk attempt (called a foul) that electrified the crowd and made the ESPN top 10 plays tonight. Murray will be a nightmare of a matchup for the team that draws them in the first round of the NCAAs this year.

Big South. #3 Winthrop pulled off the upset at top seed Coastal Carolina in their building tonight, winning 64-53 behind a strong second half and a suffocating defense that held CCU’s best player, Joseph Harris, to a mere three points on 1-6 shooting. This is Winthrop’s fifth Big South title in the last six years, an amazing feat considering that the original architect of the program, Gregg Marshall has since moved on to Wichita State (playing for its own bid tomorrow). The Eagles are probably looking at a #16 seed this year.

Atlantic Sun. East Tennessee State won its second consecutive A-Sun Tournament tonight, this time as a #5 seed. The Bucs’ pressure defense forced sixteen Mercer turnovers and held their two stars, James Florence and Danny Emerson, to nearly half their typical offensive output. Justin Tubbs had 18/3 for the winning team, This clearly isn’t a vintage ETSU team, but Murray Bartow has them back in the Dance for the third time in his career there, where they’re likely looking at a #16 seed again.

Missouri Valley. At Arch Madness, the top two seeds advanced today with #1 Northern Iowa shutting down everything #5 Bradley tried to do on offense today, and #2 Wichita State surviving a close one against Illinois State. Of course, UNI is already secure in an NCAA Tournament bid, but they’re attempting to win back-to-back MVC titles, while Wichita will not be invited unless they earn the auto-bid tomorrow. The two teams split home-and-home this year, and you’d have to believe that the Shockers will bring everything they’ve got tomorrow afternoon. RTC Live will be there covering the game.

Folks, it’s March and we’re now approximately eight days until Selection Sunday sets the sports world on fire. By our count, there are about twenty teams fighting for half as many at-large spots, and this weekend’s games will have increased importance in the all-too-important ‘sniff test.’ The NCAA Selection Committee is made of humans just like the rest of us, and if they see a couple of teams look great on tv this weekend, it could be the little extra push needed to earn a Dance card next Sunday. But it’s not just about those so-called bubble teams; it’s also about positioning. Which team will step up in the last week to grab the likely one remaining #1 seed, along with Syracuse, Kansas and Kentucky? Who will be able to secure a top four regional seed in order to play closer to home? There are so many questions unanswered still remaining. Today is the last Saturday of the regular season, and as always, we’ll be with you on Boom Goes the Dynamite throughout the day. Below are the key games we plan on keeping an eye on — of special note is that three more automatic bids will be delivered today, in the Big South, Atlantic Sun and Ohio Valley Conferences.

We will be back at 11 AM for our continuing coverage so check back then and feel free to comment or ask questions in the comment section.

11:00: Nice showing by the Duke student for GameDay. Not going to be Kentucky because of the smaller student body and smaller arena.

11:10: Ugh. Speedo guy segment coming on GameDay. I will be switching the channel for a few minutes when that segment is going to start. Way to show segments that your audience will be interested in. Would they do a “Bikini girl” segment or would that not be PC?

11:20: Coach K does not approve of “Speedo guy”. I think we have finally found something that UNC fans will agree with him on. Seriously ESPN. Why are you featuring this idiot?

11:45: So Sherron Collins was a great athlete in high school, plays video games, and like macaroni. I’m glad we found that out. Why can’t GameDay do legit segments like the one on the Syracuse zone they did earlier this year?

Noon: Hubert picks UNC. Big surprise. Knight and Bilas are calling for a Duke beat down. I’d go with something in between the two.

12:05: Three interesting games on right now none of which is the FSU-Miami game that ESPN2 decided to show over Cincinnati-Georgetown. The best of the three games is clearly the West Virginia-Villanova game, which we are doing a RTC Live for so be sure to check that out.

12:15: Interesting news: Both Luke Harangody and Austin Freeman will play today according to Seth Davis and Jeff Goodman respectively.

Big Red Freshness Lasts Right Through It. Cornell 95, Brown 76. It probably took a little longer than the nervous Big Red faithful hoped to put away the pesky Brown Bears tonight, but in the end, it was simply a formality because Cornell players were so narrowly focused on winning their third straight Ivy League title and NCAA bid that there was no way they were going to lose this game tonight. How focused were they? Try a season-best 57% shooting and an utterly ridonkulous 20-30 from deep tonight. At one point during the conflagration of shot-making by the Big Red, they hit eight treys in a row en route to an 11-13 first half. But it was the second half where Cornell exhibited its dominance, using a 14-4 run early to take control of the game and ensure another title coming to Ithaca this season. All five starters reached double figures, but it was lesser-known forward Jon Jaques who took the scoring honors with 20/7 tonight (including six threes). In all, four players had four or more threes, which we figure has to be some kind of a record for versatile and voluminous shooting! Cornell will now wait to see where their NCAA seed lies, but the smart money is on a #12 seed when the brackets are released. Anyone up for a #12/#5 upset this year?

Will 3d Time Be the Charm For Cornell? (Ithaca Journal/G. Ertl)

RTC Live.

Wichita State 73, Missouri State 63. On Quarterfinal Friday in St. Louis, top seed Northern Iowa defeated Drake, Bradley upset Creighton and Illinois State won the nightcap. And in the game you followed here on RTC Live, Wichita State held off Missouri State, 73-63. A close, hard-fought and well-played game, the Shockers were paced by Garrett Stutz, whose play in the paint helped them overcome hot outside shooting of the Bears. Stutz finished with 19 points and 6 rebounds, and converted on back-to-back possessions during a key stretch of the second half to help them pull away. The Shockers advance to play the Redbirds of Illinois State tomorrow afternoon here in St. Louis.

Conference Tourneys. Eight conference tourneys tonight, and a ridiculous thirteen tomorrow. Let’s see what was interesting…

Ohio Valley. The top two teams — Murray State and Morehead State — both advanced tonight to the finals on Saturday. Murray has put together a phenomenal 29-win season, so it’d be a shame to see them miss out on the NCAAs, but Morehead is the only OVC team to have beaten the Racers this year. It was Morehead tonight, though, not Murray, who had the comfortable win in the semis. Should be a great one on Saturday for the auto-bid.

Atlantic Sun. #6 seed Mercer continues to use its home court advantage to knock off higher-seeded teams with tonight’s victory over #2 Jacksonville. #5 East Tennessee State was able to get by #8 Kennesaw State whom had knocked off top seed Belmont last night. So it’ll be Mercer vs. ETSU for the automatic bid. The Bucs will be playing in their third A-Sun title game in four years, and will be looking to win back-t0-back NCAA bids despite having not finished first in the regular season in either of the last two years.

Horizon. In the Horizon second round tonight, #7 Detroit continues to turn heads with another upset win behind Eli Holman’s dub-dub (16/11), while #4 Milwaukee earned the pleasure of facing #1 Butler in the semifinals on Saturday by defeating #5 Cleveland State. The Titans will play #2 Wright State in the other semifinal — neither of the top two seeds have played yet in this tournament, while Detroit has already played two games and Milwaukee one.

Large Wednesday. It was a big-time night of games, the kind of evening that has you checking the clock all day long in nervous anticipation. Most of the games ended in predictable fashion, but that didn’t make them any less interesting. To get this out of the way, ranked teams #3 Kentucky, #6 Purdue, #10 New Mexico, #13 Tennessee, #15 BYU, #16 Temple, #17 Wisconsin and #24 Texas A&M all won, most easily. UNM won the Mountain West title outright, and Kentucky grabbed at least a share of the SEC title tonight. We’ll focus on the biggest games, the key games of bubbular interest, and the conference tourneys in this space tonight, though.

#2 Kansas 82, #5 Kansas State 65. ESPN got lucky that this game was only interesting for about thirty minutes tonight. At the 15:39 mark of the second half, K-State’s Luis Colon hit a layup to pull the Wildcats back within one point, and we thought this battle between Big 12 stalwarts was destined to go down to the wire in Lawrence. We were wrong. Kansas seemingly awakened from its halftime slumber and went on a quick 9-0 run to open its lead back up to double digits. KSU made one more push to get it back to six, but the Jayhawks used a 13-1 run to put the game away for the 59th consecutive time in Allen Fieldhouse. The Kansas defense, virtually nonexistent in their loss at Oklahoma State on Saturday, was back in action here, holding their in-state rival to 40% shooting and limiting the opponents not named Denis Clemente or Jacob Pullen to a mere 24 points. The old barn was rocking as Kansas won the Big 12 regular season outright and likely wrapped up a #1 seed in the NCAA Tournament as well, but we’re not completely certain because we could hardly see the action on our ESPN360 feed. KU walks into a trap game at Missouri on Saturday, while K-State should still finish second in the league with a win over Iowa State this weekend.

Sherron Collins: Winningest Player in KU History (KC Star/R. Sugg)

#23 Maryland 79, #4 Duke 72. The better big game of the night took place in College Park, as Maryland outlasted Duke in a back-and-forth contest that resulted in the Terps tying the rival Blue Devils at the top of the ACC standings with one game remaining. Ultimately, it was Gary Williams’ team, led by the animated and spectacular Greivis Vasquez (20/4/5 assts), who broke a 69-all tie with two minutes to go and ended the game on a 10-3 closing run. In particular, it was Vasquez’s running, fading, only-the-kind-of-shot-he-would-take-and-make jumper that gave Maryland a four-point lead with 39 seconds left and forced Duke to start fouling soon thereafter. We really shouldn’t read too much into one result in a rivalry game, so we won’t, but one thing is very clear in that Maryland has been playing the better part of two months much, much better than their ranking might 0therwise indicate. Since the new year turned, the Terps have only lost at Wake (when WFU was playing well), Clemson and Duke. That’s it. Pollsters have been holding four nonconference losses against them, but if Maryland isn’t a top four seed in the NCAA Tournament, then we haven’t seen one. As for the regular season title, the Terps will play in a trap game at Virginia this weekend, while Duke will actually have the easier home game against rival UNC. If both win (or lose), then Duke will win the top seed in the ACC Tournament, but suffice it just to say that these two are clearly the best two teams in the ACC. Now, about that RTC, Terp fans… we love the quick, full coverage of the court, and we know it’s been a few years since you last beat Duke, but, what if you’re the better team?

Huge Bubble Games.

Notre Dame 58, Connecticut 50. There’s absolutely no question that the Irish are playing better without all-american Luke Harangody than they were with him. Notre Dame won its third straight game over a solid team to put themselves squarely back into the NCAA picture, but with an RPI in the 60s, a win over Marquette this weekend and another in the Big East Tourney are needed. The Ls keep piling up for UConn (13 now), but how long can you hide behind the excuse of a tough schedule and some big wins before you cut them out of the picture?

Florida State 51, Wake Forest 47. Wake is busily playing itself from a projected #4 seed to outside the field in a short span of two weeks with the Deacs’ fourth straight loss tonight. Al-Farouq Aminu had a ridiculous zero-point, five-foul performance in the loss, and with a game versus surging Clemson on Sunday, Wake could be staring at five Ls in a row to end the regular season.

Memphis 70, UAB 65. In a battle of CUSA bubble teams, Memphis was able to get a big win while also wrapping up the #2 seed in next week’s Conference USA Tournament in Tulsa. In most mock brackets, UAB is the second team out of this conference, but now Memphis has swept the season series between the two. It will be interesting if they meet again in Tulsa with Memphis taking a third game as well.

The wild and wacky year in the A-Sun will continue as we head into the tournament which will take place March 3-6 at the University Center in Macon, Georgia (Mercer’s home arena). The tournament takes the top eight teams in the league. There was never a clear-cut leader in the league through most of the regular season and we were thinking that perhaps a team or two would separate from the rest of the league; however, that never happened and instead got even more jumbled after the last weekend of the regular season.

Campbell led the league through the first half of the regular season but then fell back a few spots after a tough road swing in January. The Camels got back in the thick of things after winning six straight that catapulted them to the top of the league once again. But a loss at Jacksonville on Thursday night looked to end Campbell’s hopes of winning a league title until the Dolphins turned around and lost to ETSU in the season finale on Saturday. With Lipscomb and Belmont winning their final two games of the regular season, both found themselves tied for the league’s number one spot when play concluded on Saturday night. With that, four teams tied for the regular season championship (Lipscomb, Jacksonville, Belmont, and Campbell). After all of the tiebreakers took place, Lipscomb earned the #1 seed, Jacksonville #2, Belmont #3, and Campbell #4 for the upcoming A-Sun tournament. ETSU earned the #5 seed, Mercer #6, UNF #7 and Kennesaw State #8.

With the parity of the A-Sun this season, I have a feeling that there will be some extremely exciting games in the upcoming tournament. There are no clear favorites; however, I will say that playing on Wednesday can be an advantage because the winners on Wednesday will get to have a much valuable day off before playing in the semifinals on Friday. So I would give a very slight advantage to Lipscomb and Jacksonville just for that reason.

You know why we don’t need NCAA Tournament expansion to 96 teams? The are a lot of other good reasons, but the simplest reason is that we already have it. In fact, about 300 of the 347 Division I teams have an opportunity starting tonight to ‘play their way into’ the NCAA Tournament. It’s easy — survive and advance. As long as you win, you’re still alive. And if you win three or four games in (mostly) consecutive days, you’ll see Greg Gumbel reading your name off the Big Board on Selection Sunday. Keep winning beyond that and suddenly you’re channeling NC State circa 1983.

Tickling or Madness?

There will be thirty conference tournaments played from coast to coast (and all points in-between) in the coming days, with the Big South, Ohio Valley and Horizon all starting postseason action tonight. The Atlantic Sun and Patriot will get going tomorrow, and by Saturday night, we’ll have already crowned the first three automatic bids. Twenty-seven more (plus the Ivy) will be decided over the course of the following week of play. It seems like a lot to keep up with (and it is), which is why we’ve come up with an internal tracking matrix (below) that we’re happy to share with everyone.

During our nightly ATBs, we’ll be keeping you updated as well, but here’s the high-level view of the world. Strap in folks, because March is here!

Campbellhas now won five straight and is closing a four-game homestand tonight against ETSU. It is the final home game of the season and should be an electrifying atmosphere with it being Jonathan Rodriguez’s final career game in Buies Creek. I expect the Camels to play with intensity and passion to finish out with a huge home win. The Camels close the year at Jacksonville and at North Florida.

Belmontcontinues to play well and they certainly have a scheduling advantage over the other top teams in the league. The Bruins just defeated lowly Stetson last night and they travel to a struggling Florida Gulf Coast team tomorrow. The Bruins close the season at home against Mercer and Kennesaw State.

Jacksonvillehas gotten back on track with three straight victories after losing two straight before that. They earned a nice road victory against Kennesaw State last night. However, they still have games at Mercer, at home against Campbell, and at home against ETSU. That will certainly be a tough test for the Dolphins down the stretch.

Lipscomb fell out of the top spot last week when they were knocked off by USC Upstate on the road. Lipscomb is a tough team to figure out as they are perhaps the most talented team in the league with the best big man (Adnan Hodzic) and in my opinion the best combo guard (Josh Slater). Lipscomb goes to Stetson before hosting Kennesaw State and Mercer to close out the year.

East Tennessee State has a huge game tonight at Campbell with a chance to move right back in the mix at the top of the league. After the trip to Campbell they host USC Upstate before traveling to North Florida and to Jacksonville. They must win out to have a chance at a regular season title.

Mercer is trying to move up in the league standings because they do have an advantage in that they are hosting the A-Sun tournament on their home floor. The talent is certainly there with James Florence and company but the Bears have been a streaky team throughout the year. However, they have an extremely tough three-game stretch to close the year as they host Jacksonville and travel to Belmont and Lipscomb.

North Florida has been a pesky team all season long under new head coach Matthew Driscoll. The Ospreys are still looking to improve their seed for the upcoming tournament. They travel to Kennesaw State before hosting ETSU and Campbell.

Kennesaw State is a young and talented basketball team, but they are a team that looks to be running out of gas. The Owls can still improve their seed against UNF, Belmont and Lipscomb.

USC Upstate has been known to pull some upsets in conference play. The Spartans just defeated Lipscomb last week and will be looking to win a couple more to end the season on a high note. USC Upstate plays ETSU, FGCU, and Stetson to close the season and winning two of three is certainly possible.

FGCU has fallen on hard times as they have dropped their last seven contests. The Eagles will look to at least get a win down the stretch with games against Belmont and USC Upstate.

Stetson has lost three straight and have struggled throughout the season though they have had some injury troubles. The Hatters take on Lipscomb and USC Upstate to close out the season.

Key Upcoming Games

ETSU @ Campbell (2/19) – Senior night for four Campbell seniors including all-everything Jonathan Rodriguez. It should be a very good atmosphere and will be a battle between two good teams.

Mercer @ Belmont (2/25) – If the Bruins win this game they have a great chance to win the A-Sun regular season crown. Belmont controls the tiebreaker with Campbell.

Campbell @ Jacksonville (2/25) – A battle with two teams at the top of the league standings. The game could mean one team winning the league and one falling out of the top three.

ETSU @ Jacksonville (2/27) – Both teams with tough tests to finish the year. It could be a battle for first place by that point.

A10 coaches have no illusions that the conference’s reputation (however good among the non-BCS conferences) will carry a bubble team into the field of 65. While few subscribe to former Temple head coach John Chaney’s“Anyone, Anywhere” philosophy, everyone recognizes the virtue of playing invitational tournaments and having a healthy dose of road games on the resume. Most of their OOC resume-building games may come from traditional rivalries and invitational fields, but the road games, at worst, help their squads prepare for the hostile crowds they will face when playing conference opponents. How did the conference members do this OOC season? (…)

For the most part, it was just a really ugly week for the MWC. Aside from BYU’s win in the Vegas Classic and UNLV’s success in the first couple rounds of the Diamond Head Classic (and really, despite their names, neither of the fields at those tournaments deserved the “Classic” label), there was carnage all around. New Mexico survived an upset bid by Creighton, only to slip up at Oral Roberts for their first loss of the year. Utah lost to Illinois State and Pepperdine (yes, Pepperdine, a team who improved their record to 4-10 with that win over Utah). Air Force fell to Northern Arizona. TCU got drilled by Houston. San Diego State looked lost against Arizona State. Colorodo State couldn’t take advantage of a weakened UCLA team. And, Wyoming fell apart in the second half at Northern Iowa, and in the process the MWC lost the inaugural MWC/MVC Challenge (although, given the results, perhaps they ought to switch the conference billings in the title) 5-4. (…)

The Florida Gulf Coast Eagles have not had much success since their transition to the Division I level to this point. However, this current stretch might be their most successful that includes one of their best wins in program history. Just the other night the Eagles knocked off Big East member DePaul in front of their home crowd. The win was the first for the Eagles against a Big East opponent. FGCU has now won four games in a row which is their longest streak since becoming a Division I member. Sophomore point guard Reggie Chambers has been stellar during the winning streak. He has won back-to-back A-Sun player of the week honors, the first player this season to do so. He along with Reed Baker and Anthony Banks can make this team a legitimate threat in the A-Sun race.

Biggest Disappointment

The Jacksonville Dolphins were predicted by many to win the conference this season. I had them picked second but nonetheless the Dolphins are playing bad basketball right now. They have started out league play at 0-2, losing by a combined 39 points in their first two A-Sun games to Campbell and ETSU. I thought that perhaps their brutal non-conference schedule would better prepare them for league play but that has not been the case at all. The Dolphins are only averaging 63 points per contest while giving up 78 points per game and allowing teams to shoot close to 52 percent from the floor. Their field goal percentage defense is last in the league. The Dolphins are also last in the league in assist to turnover ratio. Most thought this season could be the one for the Dolphins to finally win the league as they return four starters from last season’s runner-up team. JU still has plenty of time left to get it back together but they need to get back on track sooner rather than later.

Best of the Rest

Belmont -After being the league’s hottest team two weeks ago, the Bruins have dropped two straight. However, the most important thing is that they are still perfect in league play as the holidays are here. Coach Rick Byrd always seems to get the very most out of his teams so I expect the Bruins to be in contention in league play.

Campbell -The Camels came out flat against UNC-Wilmington as they fell by 20 to the Seahawks and it looked to be the start of a losing streak. However, Campbell got it back together by knocking off conference foe Jacksonville by 16 at home. The Camels are off to a nice 2-0 start to league play and that is the most important thing, but coach Robbie Laing has to be disappointed with his team’s effort against Longwood. The Lancers built a 20-point lead and held off a late Campbell run to win by eight. Campbell is still in good shape and looks to be a major contender in the A-Sun.

ETSU – The Bucs pounded Jacksonville by 23 just a few nights ago to improve to 2-0 in the league. I wasn’t sure how the team would come out this season after losing their top two scorers from a year ago, but coach Murray Bartow has reloaded with more athleticism and speed, and has his team playing with a lot of energy. The Bucs will certainly compete at the top of the league and will be looking for their second straight A-Sun title and NCAA berth.

Kennesaw State -The Owls have dropped three straight but all have come against formidable opponents and all have been on the road. Freshman Markeith Cummings continues to impress as he is the league’s third leading scorer at over 17 per game. With more athleticism than in years past I expect this team to make a little noise as conference play continues after the holidays.

Lipscomb – The Bisons continue to struggle as they stumble into the holidays losers of two straight. However, those two games were against Cincinnati and Arizona. They were blown out by the Bearcats but went to overtime with ‘Zona, falling by just a point on a controversial buzzer-beater by Nic Wise. The Bisons are still dead last in the league in scoring defense (83.4 ppg) and are tenth in the conference in field goal percentage (50.6%). The defense must get better quick if Lipscomb wants to compete at the top of the league.

Mercer – The Bears continue to struggle as they have lost two straight games. However, both losses have come to SEC heavyweights Vanderbilt and Alabama. The most disappointing part is that the Bears have not been competitive at all in those games. Mercer needs to get things rolling in a hurry as conference play is creeping up very quickly in the coming weeks.

North Florida – The Ospreys have continued to play hard under new head coach Matthew Driscoll and have won three straight contests by knocking off Canisius and New Orleans in the Southern Miss Christmas Classic before defeating Southern Miss in the championship game. It could very well be the most successful stretch of games for UNF as a Division I member. This team plays extremely hard and teams in this league cannot sleep on them when conference play gets into full force.

Stetson – There is really no way around but the Hatters just might be the worst team in the league at this point. Their only two wins have come against non-Division I opponents but I don’t expect too many victories from this team. Guard A.J. Smith (13.4 ppg) is the only legitimate scoring threat for the Hatters. Stetson is near the bottom of the league in just about every offensive category and I don’t expect it to get much better as conference play approaches.

USC Upstate – The Spartans got off to a nice start at Arizona State just yesterday and only fell to the Sun Devils by nine. The Spartans have a nice starting five but are not particularly deep and that will continue to hurt them. Still, Upstate is well coached and should cause some problems in league play.

Key Upcoming Games

Mercer @ UNC Charlotte (12/29) – Mercer has the talent to compete against high major opponents. Charlotte has gotten off to a blistering start with their only losses coming at the hands off Duke and ODU.

Belmont @ Kansas (12/29) – An extremely tough post-Christmas, pre-New Year’s battle against the number one team in the land in Allen Fieldhouse. Belmont plays hard but they will be physically outmanned and I don’t expect it to be close.

FGCU @ Stetson (12/29) – FGCU can join the top of the league if they can knock off the Hatters on the road. The Eagles must win games like this in order to finish in the upper tier of the league.

Mercer @ Jacksonville (1/2) – Big conference showdown between two struggling teams. The winner can perhaps build some momentum as league play gets going. The loser may have a rough ride in the A-Sun.